Spectrum Sports is a former

regional sports network In the United States and Canada, a regional sports network (RSN) is a cable television channel (many of which are also distributed on direct broadcast satellite services) that presents sports programming to a local market or geographical region ...

owned by

Charter Communications Charter Communications, Inc., is an American telecommunications and mass media company with services branded as Spectrum. With over 32 million customers in 41 states, it is the second-largest cable operator in the United States by subscribe ...

through its acquisition of

Time Warner Cable Time Warner Cable, Inc. (TWC) was an American cable television company. Before it was acquired by Charter Communications on May 18, 2016, it was ranked the second largest cable company in the United States by revenue behind only Comcast, opera ...

, including its

Milwaukee Milwaukee ( ), officially the City of Milwaukee, is both the most populous and most densely populated city in the U.S. state of Wisconsin and the county seat of Milwaukee County. With a population of 577,222 at the 2020 census, Milwaukee i ...

and Eastern Wisconsin cable franchises, in May 2016. Broadcasting on Channel 32 exclusively on Charter Spectrum systems in the Milwaukee and Green Bay/Fox Cities areas, the channel launched in February 2007. This is not to be confused with WACY, Green Bay's actual broadcast Channel 32, which airs on Spectrum channel 83 on its northeastern Wisconsin systems. The channel featured a mix of local sports roundtable discussion shows, UW-

Milwaukee Panthers The Milwaukee Panthers are the athletic teams of the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee. A total of 13 Panthers athletic teams compete in NCAA Division I. The Panthers have won the James J. McCafferty Trophy as the Horizon League's all-sports ch ...

sporting events, programs featuring the former sports directors of several local television stations and newspapers, coaches' shows, high school sports, and other minor professional sports within the Milwaukee and Green Bay franchise areas of Spectrum. Until 2013 the network also aired Marquette Golden Eagles sports, including men's

college basketball In United States colleges, top-tier basketball is governed by collegiate athletic bodies including National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA), the United States Collegiate Athleti ...

games from

ESPN Plus ESPN+ is an American over-the-top subscription video streaming service available in the United States, owned by Disney Media and Entertainment Distribution, in partnership with ESPN Inc., which is a joint venture between The Walt Disney Com ...

, rebroadcasts of ESPN Marquette games, other Marquette sports, and archived Marquette sports programming; this was discontinued that year due to the new

Big East Conference The Big East Conference is a collegiate athletic conference that competes in NCAA Division I in ten men's sports and twelve women's sports. Headquartered in New York City, the eleven full-member schools are primarily located in Northeast and ...

contract with

Fox Sports 1 Fox Sports 1 (FS1) is an American pay television channel owned by the Fox Sports Media Group, a unit of Fox Corporation. FS1 replaced the motorsports network Speed on August 17, 2013, at the same time that its companion channel Fox Sports 2 ...

which will see some games sub-licensed to Fox Sports Wisconsin locally, and the athletic department considering taking their coach's shows online-only or discontinuing them altogether. The

Horizon League The Horizon League is an 11-school collegiate athletic conference in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I, whose members are located in and near the Great Lakes region. The Horizon League founded in 1979 as the Mi ...

also moved to a mix of airing their games through

ESPN+ ESPN (originally an initialism for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by ESPN Inc., owned jointly by The Walt Disney Company (80%) and Hearst Communications (20%). The c ...

and

Stadium A stadium ( : stadiums or stadia) is a place or venue for (mostly) outdoor sports, concerts, or other events and consists of a field or stage either partly or completely surrounded by a tiered structure designed to allow spectators to stand o ...

(the latter sometimes simulcast by WVTV's "My 24" subchannel), leaving the network without much college game programming. The network also had rights through Time Warner Cable/Spectrum's 'official cable partner' designation to carry programming produced by and revolving around the

Green Bay Packers The Green Bay Packers are a professional American football team based in Green Bay, Wisconsin. The Packers compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the National Football Conference (NFC) North division. It is the t ...

. On May 18, 2016,

Charter A charter is the grant of authority or rights, stating that the granter formally recognizes the prerogative of the recipient to exercise the rights specified. It is implicit that the granter retains superiority (or sovereignty), and that the re ...

completed its merger with Time Warner Cable, after an earlier attempt by

Comcast Comcast Corporation (formerly known as American Cable Systems and Comcast Holdings),Before the AT&T merger in 2001, the parent company was Comcast Holdings Corporation. Comcast Holdings Corporation now refers to a subsidiary of Comcast Corpora ...

to merge with Time Warner had failed the year before, placing the network and Time Warner Cable's Milwaukee operations under the control of Charter. As a result, it and the other ex-TWC RSNs rebranded under the umbrella of ''Spectrum Sports''.

Replacement with Spectrum News 1 Wisconsin

The channel was never added to Charter's legacy systems in Wisconsin. This was due to Spectrum launching a statewide 24-hour news channel, Spectrum News 1 Wisconsin; a lack of sports job postings for the effort suggested that the content of Spectrum Sports would be merged into the new effort, with a relocation of the rebranded channel space to Channel 1 statewide. This was confirmed by Spectrum in October 2018, and Spectrum Sports ended autonomous operations before the launch of the new Spectrum News channel on November 27 at 6 a.m., using space in Spectrum's downtown Milwaukee headquarters. Time Warner planned to launch "Time Warner News Wisconsin" in the mid-2000s before deciding not to launch a news channel at the time and focus on a more scalable local sports channel. The network continued with archived content for the next month, going off the air late on December 31, 2018.

Programming

The following shows were broadcast and produced by the network: *The Roundtable – A roundtable show featuring Spectrum Sports' Sports Director Dennis Krause and state sports journalists. Airs weeknights. *Dennis Krause Show - A half-hour profile show with Krause interviewing sports coaches and former Wisconsin sports greats. *Sports32 Weekly – Weekly round-up of high school, college, or professional, premieres Tuesdays. *Timber Rattlers Field Pass - Program featuring stories, news and profiles involving Appleton's minor league baseball team, the

Wisconsin Timber Rattlers The Wisconsin Timber Rattlers are a Minor League Baseball team of the Midwest League and the High-A affiliate of the Milwaukee Brewers. They are located in Grand Chute, Wisconsin, a town on the outskirts of Appleton in the Fox Cities, and are na ...

. *The Rob Jeter Show – Official weekly coach's show for Milwaukee men's basketball coach Rob Jeter, with Bill Johnson. *The Keith Tozer Show – A weekly show involving the

XSL In computing, the term Extensible Stylesheet Language (XSL) is used to refer to a family of languages used to transform and render XML documents. Historically, the W3C XSL Working Group produced a draft specification under the name "XSL," whic ...

indoor soccer Indoor soccer or arena soccer (known internationally as indoor football, fast football, or showball) is five-a-side version of minifootball, derived from association football and adapted to be played in walled hardcourt indoor arena. Indoor s ...

league and the Milwaukee Wave, featuring Wave coach

Keith Tozer Keith Tozer is a retired American soccer player who played professionally in the Major Indoor Soccer League, American Soccer League and American Indoor Soccer Association. He is currently the commissioner of the Major Arena Soccer League. Playe ...

, with Dennis Krause. *"The Midwest Ballers Show" The following sporting events were carried by Spectrum Sports (Wisconsin): * WIAA athletics *

athletics *

baseball *

Milwaukee Admirals The Milwaukee Admirals are a professional ice hockey team in the American Hockey League (AHL). They play in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, United States, at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee Panther Arena. They are affiliated with the NHL's Nashvil ...

hockey *

Green Bay Gamblers The Green Bay Gamblers are a Tier I junior ice hockey team in the Eastern Conference of the United States Hockey League (USHL). They play in Ashwaubenon, Wisconsin, at the Resch Center. History Professional hockey in Green Bay The first profes ...

hockey * Milwaukee Wave indoor soccer *

Green Bay Blizzard Green is the color between cyan and yellow on the visible spectrum. It is evoked by light which has a dominant wavelength of roughly 495570 nm. In subtractive color systems, used in painting and color printing, it is created by a combin ...

arena football *

Milwaukee Iron Milwaukee ( ), officially the City of Milwaukee, is both the most populous and most densely populated city in the U.S. state of Wisconsin and the county seat of Milwaukee County. With a population of 577,222 at the 2020 census, Milwaukee is ...

arena football Other shows that aired on Spectrum Sports (Wisconsin): *''

All-Access'' *''

Coach's Show'' *''Sidelines'' *''On the Water Adventures'' *''Hunter's Exchange'' *''John Gillespies Waters & Woods'' *''Midwest Classic Golf with Tom Sutton'' *''Raceline''

References

{{Sports television in the United States

Wisconsin Wisconsin () is a state in the upper Midwestern United States. Wisconsin is the 25th-largest state by total area and the 20th-most populous. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake M ...

Television stations in Milwaukee Defunct local cable stations in the United States Television stations in Green Bay, Wisconsin Television channels and stations established in 2007 Television channels and stations disestablished in 2018